Enough
"Sleep."
She barely recognises her voice and she has no knowledge of the time. But she isn't tired, she's no longer in pain. She just feels numb. He won't take his eyes off her. It's like he physically can't. And when she looks at him looking at her, all she can see is fear and loss and care. So much care she physically aches for it. It's an alien concept to her in such a situation.
In a hospital with its four walls and its beeping machines, the coffee that dishwater tastes better than and the apathetic faces of health professionals who offer their support, medical and moral.
Nick has been here before. It's all far too familiar to him. It makes him feel unsettled. The cotton sheet thrown over Carla's legs; its fibres he runs his fingers along touch every single one of his nerves until they itch. His skin is on edge and he is being suffocated by air so clean, so breathable, it is hard not to choke on when it was once all he could live because of. The hard mattress, the white pillows. The wires and the plastic stuck to skin and the quiet. It is so quiet, but the quiet is loud.
She calls his name for a second time. She knows his head is in another place entirely. A lack of sleep can't help with that.
"Nick."
He has since moved to the side of her unbroken arm, yet that is not to say it does not hurt to move because it does. But she manages it, her fingers moving along the bed to sit upon his own, to get his attention. His eyes are red and unblinking and his exhaustion can be seen in yesterday's clothes, his unshaved face. The genuine smile he throws at her she knows she doesn't deserve.
"Sorry," he whispers and he is apologetic about it. Her chest has never felt so tight. "I zoned out for a minute there."
Carla's face is turned to him. She simply taps a finger over his hand, like a scold. Like what she wishes could be a slap.
"Sleep," she repeats, and he misunderstands her.
"I'll be here when you wake up."
"No." She is muttering. She is wondering whether she is even understandable, whether she is even understandable to him. He frowns and sighs loudly, deeply, and she has to continue. "You need to sleep, baby. I'm okay. Promise."
He stares at her for a long moment. He looks as if he is going to cry.
"Are you? Honestly, are you?" And his eyes are everywhere, searching her body for injury, more injury. A cause for concern; anything he can tend to. It breaks her heart.
"Yes," she whispers as he somewhat reluctantly pulls his chair closer to her bed. Doing as her eyes are telling him to. Slowly, she forces herself to raise her arm and she aligns it with the back of his head, pulling him down against the mattress so that he is resting against it, and she hears him laugh slightly once he has realised what she's made him do.
Her eyes close and she cards her fingers through his hair. It needs washing and she knows hers does, too. He has been in this state for as long as she has. Has been by her side at every possible moment he could've been. She was never alone. She never felt it, either. He was a constant; her constant. And she never wants that feeling of togetherness to fade.
"Thank you," she says. She knows he isn't sleeping. Knows he probably won't until she does, but his resting is enough for her for now. It has helped to calm down her own breathing in actual fact. Calm washes over them for a time and she thanks him again and again. And then thank you becomes I love you and I'm sorry and she's sure he's drifted off because he doesn't reply to her, he doesn't react or move or even breathe in a way that tells her he is listening.
And then he whispers, so brokenly, "I thought I was gonna lose you."
Carla stiffens immediately, stops her stroking of his hair. Opens her eyes. Stares at the ceiling and its cracks, its dim light.
"You haven't," she assures him in such a small voice.
"I'm so scared because I don't know what my life is without you and I tried to imagine it. I tried so hard, Carla. When you were being operated on, I sat there and I couldn't eat or sleep and all I could do was think. So much thinking." He stops his rambling. She knows he is crying, but she can't bring herself to acknowledge it. "My head really hurts," he admits.
So Carla rubs it like she can rub it better, this better, them better. Herself better. They daren't look at each other.
"Then sleep, eh?"
But he moves his head so that it is closer to hers and she takes in his face - every detail worn down by complete and utter exhaustion, his tear tracks all she seems to be able to focus on - and allows him to kiss her nose. Her smile is gorgeous. It takes up her entire face for the briefest of moments. It hurts to smile, but he is worth every twinge of pain in the cuts on her face. He looks content and relaxed, rested, and she lets him share her pillow, him now kneeling on the cold hospital floor beside the bed and he does not give a single thought to the aching joints in his bent knees.
"I love you," he begins. There's more, of course. But she can't hear any of it. She doesn't want to hear him sing her nonexistent praises. Doesn't want him to big her up, to tell her it wasn't her fault when if she'd have been as loyal as she once had pride in herself for being, she'd never have had reason to be in the bistro. To put herself in such a stupid, reckless position.
"No, I love you," she chokes and the tears don't stop. He lets them fall, lets her let it out. And when she asks him to lie with her, he barely hesitates, thoughts of and a longing for home at the forefront of each of their minds.